Privacy policy

What Cluewood keeps, and where it goes.

Effective: 3 November 2026

Who we are

Cluewood is developed by Josh Waller, trading as Kovus, in Perth, Western Australia. Contact josh@kovus.dev with privacy questions or requests. We handle personal information in line with the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles.

What stays on your iPhone

Your progress

Cluewood saves your case progress, board moves, hints, results, history, habit days and the case files it has downloaded on your iPhone, so you can play and keep your place. The Today widget shows only the day's case, its status and your habit marks, never board positions. Kept on the phone until you use Delete progress on this phone or remove the app. An iPhone or iCloud backup you make may keep a copy.

Your settings

Your play mode, sound, haptics, appearance, board layout, how Smudge and the cast appear and move, reminders, and the outfit and app icon you choose in the Wardrobe are saved on your iPhone, and so is your Game Center choice. Kept on the phone until you change them, delete progress or remove the app. An iPhone or iCloud backup may keep a copy.

Age range

If Cluewood needs an age check where you live, it asks Apple's Declared Age Range feature for your age range when you first open the app, at most once every 12 months after that, and when you tap to check on the Friends tab. It never asks for your date of birth. If the range is under 13 or unknown, Game Center stays off. The range is used only for these restrictions and to comply with the law, and the app doesn't send it, or anything worked out from it, to Cluewood's paid-content check or any other service. Apple's age check needs iOS 26.2 or later; on earlier versions Cluewood can't run it, so it doesn't ask and Game Center stays off. A parent's approval to download Cluewood isn't consent to every use of data. The age range stays in the app's memory for the check and isn't saved; at most the resulting restriction is kept on the phone. The app also keeps the date of the last check, so it knows when 12 months have passed.

iPhone and iCloud backups

If you back up your iPhone with iCloud Backup or a computer, the backup includes Cluewood's data, and restoring it brings your progress back. Apple and the phone's owner control backups under Apple's terms, and Kovus can't see them. Controlled by the phone's owner and Apple's backup settings. Removing Cluewood or deleting progress doesn't remove an earlier backup.

Things you share

When you tap Share, Report a problem or Export my data, Cluewood makes the result text, report or file on your iPhone and opens the iPhone share sheet. You choose what to send and where it goes; Cluewood's code doesn't upload it to a server. Whoever you send it to keeps it under their own terms. If you send it to support, the support sections of this policy apply.

Plus purchases

Purchase history

Plus subscriptions and the lifetime purchase go through the App Store. Apple handles payment, and Kovus never receives your payment-card details. When you buy, restore or redeem Plus, and when the app checks your Plus status, Apple and RevenueCat handle the App Store purchase and transaction records: the product, price, currency and storefront, and renewal, trial and refund state. They're needed to sell, restore and check Plus, and RevenueCat also uses them to report purchase activity to us. RevenueCat doesn't receive your progress or settings. Apple and RevenueCat keep purchase records under their own legal and operational obligations. Deleting Cluewood doesn't cancel a subscription or remove purchase records.

Purchase id

RevenueCat creates an anonymous id for your purchases on your iPhone (its RevenueCat anonymous id, also called the anonymous app user id). RevenueCat receives that id with the store's transaction ids and sees the IP address of the connection. RevenueCat's software also sends RevenueCat, with each request, your iPhone's identifier for this developer's apps (IDFV), its model and iOS version, the app's version, your preferred languages and your App Store country. It lets RevenueCat keep this installation's purchases together without a Cluewood account. Anonymous doesn't mean unconnected: the id links all the purchases made from this installation. After a reinstall or on a new phone, Restore purchases makes Plus available to that installation's new id too: RevenueCat merges (aliases) the two anonymous ids into one customer record, and both keep Plus. Cluewood never switches RevenueCat to any other id. Delete progress on this phone doesn't change this id; removing the app removes it from your phone. RevenueCat keeps the id with the purchase records it belongs to, under its own legal and operational obligations.

Plus case downloads

Plus cases aren't inside the app. Each time the app downloads one, it sends Cluewood's paid-content check the RevenueCat anonymous id, the case ids and revisions it needs, and the app's public Supabase key. Supabase also receives the IP address of the connection and the request details. The check passes the anonymous id to RevenueCat, which answers whether it has Plus, and then sends back only released cases. Your saves, progress and gameplay aren't part of the request.

To limit misuse, the check counts requests for each id and each IP address, and it remembers for a short time that an id has Plus. Both are stored as keyed hashes (codes made with a secret key) rather than as the id or address. Supabase runs the check in the United States (us-east-1, N. Virginia).

The check stores no app user id or IP address. Its request counters are kept under keyed hashes, one for each id and each address per hour. Remembered Plus, also under a keyed hash, is renewed each time RevenueCat confirms Plus and lapses at RevenueCat's expiry or at most a day after the last confirmation, whichever is sooner, or at once when RevenueCat says the id doesn't have Plus. Nothing removes lapsed rows on a schedule: each later request deletes up to 500 lapsed counters and 500 lapsed remembered-Plus rows, so after a quiet spell they stay until the next request. Supabase's own platform logs follow the plan's log retention (7 days on the Pro plan, per Supabase's pricing page).

Refunds

Refunds for Plus are requested from Apple. RevenueCat can answer Apple's refund-related requests for information on a developer's behalf; Cluewood leaves that setting at "Do not handle", so Cluewood doesn't send Apple usage data about you when you ask for a refund.

Free case downloads

When the app checks for new free cases and downloads them, Cloudflare receives the request: the file addresses, the request time, the IP address and user agent of the connection, and Cloudflare's network and security details. The app sends no Cluewood id, purchase id or progress with these requests. The time on Cloudflare's reply also keeps the app's release clock right. Cloudflare Workers Logs are turned off for Cluewood's content service. Cloudflare's own security and analytics processing follows its terms.

Game Center

Connecting Game Center

Game Center is optional. Only if you tap Connect on the Friends tab does the app read your Apple Game Center player identifier and whether Game Center marks the account as underage. It doesn't fetch your friends, nickname or avatar. Apple runs Game Center under its own terms. Cluewood doesn't connect an account that Game Center marks as underage, and where an age check applies, Game Center stays off for an under-13 or unknown age range. Game Center in Cluewood needs iOS 26.2 or later, because earlier versions can't run Apple's age check. Apple controls Game Center data. Cluewood keeps your Game Center consent and a note of the achievements it has already sent on this phone; Delete progress on this phone clears them, even if you keep your settings.

Scores and achievements

While you're connected, the app sends Game Center your leaderboard scores (Longest run and Clean solves) and achievement progress, worked out on your phone from cases you've finished, and, on iOS 26 or later, that you're playing today's case (shown in Apple's Games app). It doesn't send board positions, clue wording or notes. Who sees your scores follows your Game Center settings, which you can change in the Settings app. Deleting progress in Cluewood doesn't remove anything from Game Center. Apple controls Game Center retention and removal. Apple's Game Center privacy notice explains how to manage that data.

Analytics and crash reports

Cluewood doesn't include analytics or crash-reporting services, so the app doesn't send usage events, crash reports or performance timings to Kovus or a service provider. If you turn on Share With App Developers in your iPhone's Analytics & Improvements settings, Apple may give Kovus crash reports and usage statistics about Cluewood under Apple's terms; you control that setting. If something goes wrong, you can tell us through Report a problem or by email (see Support below). If a later version adds analytics or crash reporting, we'll update this policy before that version is released.

Reminders

If you allow notifications, Cluewood schedules daily reminders, a Sunday recap and an optional reminder before a free trial ends, all on your iPhone. Cluewood doesn't use a push-notification server.

Support

Contacting support

If you email josh@kovus.dev, we receive your email address, any name you include and the email's delivery information. We use them only to answer you and handle your request, never for marketing. Support email is hosted by Google. Kovus's procedure is to delete support correspondence within 90 days after the case closes, unless a specific legal obligation or active dispute requires keeping it. Google keeps its own service records under its terms.

What you send support

Your message and anything you choose to attach: a screenshot, the case id, the app and iOS version, or a report from Report a problem. Support never asks for your Apple password, payment card details, identity documents or proof of age. Messages and attachments are kept with the support correspondence and deleted under the same procedure.

Services we use

• Apple: StoreKit purchases, Game Center if you connect it, Declared Age Range where an age check applies, and iCloud Backup if you use it. Apple acts under its own terms, not for us. Apple's privacy policy.
• RevenueCat: keeps purchase records and the anonymous purchase id for us, and answers the paid-content check's question about Plus. United States. RevenueCat's privacy policy and data processing addendum.
• Cloudflare: serves the free case files from its global network. Cloudflare's customer data processing addendum.
• Supabase: hosts Cluewood's paid-content check (a function and a database) in us-east-1, United States (N. Virginia). Supabase's data processing addendum.
• Google: hosts the josh@kovus.dev support mailbox. Google's data processing terms.

RevenueCat, Cloudflare, Supabase and Google protect the information they receive through Cluewood to the same or an equal standard as this policy describes, under their data processing terms with Kovus. Apple handles what it receives under its own privacy policy. These services also see your iPhone's IP address, as any internet service does when your iPhone connects to it.

Overseas handling

Your progress stays on your iPhone. RevenueCat and Supabase process information in the United States. Apple, Cloudflare and Google may process information in other countries where they operate. Overseas providers can be subject to the laws of the countries in which they operate.

Security

Purchase checks and case downloads use encrypted HTTPS connections, and the app checks every downloaded case against its signed catalogue before using it. No system can be guaranteed completely secure.

Your choices and rights

• Delete progress on this phone (in Settings) removes Cluewood's data from this phone, apart from RevenueCat's anonymous purchase id (see Purchase id). Removing the app removes all of it. Earlier backups follow your backup settings.
• Export my data makes a copy of your progress that you can keep or share.
• There's no Cluewood account to delete. For information a service holds, such as RevenueCat's purchase records, email josh@kovus.dev. For Game Center and other Apple data, use Apple's own controls.

Email josh@kovus.dev to ask what personal information Kovus holds about you, ask for a correction or deletion, or make a privacy complaint. You can find information about privacy complaints at the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner.

European Economic Area, United Kingdom and Switzerland

Josh Waller, trading as Kovus, is the controller of the personal information described in this policy. Purchase processing, the paid-content check, case downloads and Game Center, if you connect it, are needed to provide what you ask for. Information that stays on your iPhone is processed only there. Subject to applicable conditions and exceptions, you may have rights to access, correct, erase, restrict or object to processing, and to receive a portable copy of your information. Email us with a request. You may also complain to the data protection authority in your country.

Children

Cluewood is a daily logic game for teens and adults, rated 13+ and not in the Kids category. It isn't directed to children under 13 and doesn't knowingly collect a child's personal information. A store age rating doesn't stop a child getting the app, so where an age check applies and shows an under-13 or unknown range, Game Center stays off. Where Apple's parental consent applies, Apple stops the app from opening if a parent withdraws consent.

Changes and contact

We may update this policy when the app or its service providers change. Before Cluewood starts a new kind of data use, we'll update this policy and take any step the law then requires. The current version and its effective date will remain on this page. Email josh@kovus.dev with a question or request.

Read the terms of use or visit Cluewood support.